This invention relates to pallets constructed from paperboard, and more particularly to pallets constructed from paperboard items including cores or tubes which heretofore generally have been considered as waste material.
Large amounts of thick walled paperboard or fiber cores or tubes are used by various industries which thereafter must be disposed of. For example, paper, paperboard, carpet, cloth and plastics are wound about such cores by paper, carpet, clothing and plastic manufacturers respectively, and after removal of these products from the cores, the cores generally are disposed of. The results of a survey reported upon in the October, 1989, issue of "American Paper Maker" indicates that of some 61 printers surveyed in the United States the usage of fiber core per year ranged from 20 to 1,250 tons, and that of these printers some 44 percent disposed of the cores by landfill while 25 percent sell the cores with scrap paper and 25 percent use a waste disposal service. Most (61 percent) of the printers surveyed experienced disposal problems not the least of which is the cost involved in disposing of the fiber cores. The conclusion of the survey was that fiber core disposal is a growing and costly problem among printers. The same can be said of the cores about which carpet is wound.
One of the problems in disposing of heavywall cores or tubes is that generally they are not desirable for recycling into new paperboard because they do not breakdown readily in the pulper due to the size and mass of the cores, e.g., paper cores are typically five feet to eight feet in length, have various outside diameters, four inch, five inch and six inch being very common, and three-eights to three-quarter inch wall thickness. Carpet cores may range in length from eight feet to fifteen feet. With landfills rapidly reaching saturation levels, governmental authorities are mandating the recycling of packaging material. Accordingly, it is imperative that efficient recycling use of these cores or tubes be found.
Although the need for recycling of paperboard materials has been recognized, the known prior art has not proposed the recycling of such material, and especially cores or tubes of the aforesaid type in a manner proposed by the present invention for the construction of pallets. Generally, pallets are constructed of wood which, when they become spent, must either be sent to a landfill or incinerated. Furthermore, wood pallets have nails connecting the members together which, when they become loose can cut or tear fiber and paper products and the like which are supported on the pallets, as well as posing a safety hazard to personnel handling the pallets.
There have been numerous suggestions for the use of paperboard or cardboard for the construction of pallets in the prior art and, in fact, an entire sub-class of the United States Patent & Trademark Office classification is devoted thereto, i.e., Class 108, sub-class 51.3. The most pertinent art known or located during a search of the patented art conducted in preparation to the filing of the present application includes the following U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,643,080 (Vogel); 2,698,696 (Strong); 2,798,685 (Mooney); 4,391,202 (Carter et al); 4,802,421 (Atterby et al); 4,831,938 (Atterby et al); 4,867,074 (Quasnick) and 4,875,419 (Helton et al). Although these patents describe cardboard and paperboard pallets having horizontal arrangements of tubing of various cross sectional configurations, each requires substantially all of such tubing to be specially constructed, that is, recycled tubing or the like was not envisioned. In fact, in all of these patents the proposal is to specially form the runners or longitudinal members, generally by folding and bending of cardboard sheets.